


A Mark, A Brand, A Scar

by gadgetsandgizmos



Category: Ghostbusters (2016)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Slow Burn, Smut, so much fighting, why can't these two nerds get it right?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-24
Updated: 2017-06-03
Packaged: 2018-10-23 09:44:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10716945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gadgetsandgizmos/pseuds/gadgetsandgizmos
Summary: True love isn't always rainbows and stardust. Sometimes it's messy and gritty and raw with passion that cuts deep. Sometimes, you learn to fall in love with someone's edges before you ever see the light behind their eyes.Or, the one where Erin and Holtzmann can't seem to stop fighting with each other long enough to properly fall in love.





	1. Maelstrom Chaos

**Author's Note:**

> So I know a lot of you are waiting on another chapter of Across the Universe, HOWEVER. I've been writing this little piece for a while (it's not so little, actually, it's fast approaching 10,000 words) and I've run it by a couple of my trusted reader friends who have good brains and are apt to tell me if something is actually garbage. They seem to think it's all right. So, it's gonna be a shorter fic (maybe five chapters), but I really wanted to explore a different side of Holtzbert's passion - sometimes, the fights and the arguments and the raw passion is more beautiful than shiny, happy love. Because even though it's the hardest love to maintain, sometimes it's a precursor to the sort that really lasts. 
> 
> This is kind of a part character study, part love story, but I just see so many beautiful flaws in these two and I had to poke at them and put them in a pressure cooker a little bit for it, so I hope you all enjoy. 
> 
> PS, I wasn't actually dead - my absence was due to a much needed vacation where I got to genuinely relax and enjoy myself for a change. It was quite inspirational, actually. I think y'all are gonna benefit.

Sometimes, Holtzmann wonders what force in the universe drew her to Erin Gilbert and vice-versa.

On paper, they couldn’t be two more different people.

Holtzmann had her zany fashion sense, a biting, quirky sense of humor and a quick wit that tended to push too far and drag too long. She was an engineer, hell-bent on learning what made machines and people alike tick, what tore them apart and reconnected all the wires and sinew until they were a cohesive whole once more. Her mind worked just as quickly as her tongue, spinning on a precarious axis that spiraled out of control and made her hands itch to tinker, to tame, to _take_ and perfect like a sculptor or artist approached their raw materials.

Erin was the calm after a raging storm. She was passionate, but meticulously so. Every tick, every feature, every emotion had a place and purpose and she bathed herself in control. When she was younger, she had longed to place her lips at the font of recklessness and abandon, drink deep and draw the essence into her veins where it could sit, like poison, for just a little while before her mask slid back into place. Her hands could button herself into tweed suits and proper, academic attire, but she burned beneath, a cataclysm of wonder and questions, the scientific method and all its room for exploration, a desire to harness the unknown and keep it for herself. She longed to break new ground, to make her mark on the world and know, without a shadow of a doubt, that she was destined for _greatness_ when she’d been mocked, so long, for wanting.

When a wild tempest met the rush of an endless river, they dissected at a fork and became one.

They were forces of nature, both, and brought out the best in each other.

Sometimes, they brought out the very worst in each other as well.

Such was the thing about nature: though it can occasionally be harnessed and studied, it can never truly be controlled.

 

* * *

 

 

“Holtzmann, why is your _shit_ everywhere?”

Erin’s voice was strained with irritation, hot and tight against her vocal chords.

Holtzmann looked up from her work bench with a puzzled look knitting her usually jovial features, the playfulness gone when cobalt locked to ice and held.

Heat crackled between them, and they each chose a corner for battle.

“Well I’m _sorry_ , Erin, for creating things that save your sweet ass on the reg,” Holtzmann retorted, her chest puffed out with pride as her eyes scanned the floor for the ‘shit’ the physicist had mentioned with such disdain.

The redhead was in a mood.

Usually, this happened for two reasons.

One, she was frustrated with herself for not meeting up to her own, unreasonable expectations.

Two, she had discovered something was outside of her precious control and fought to keep everything else in line to compensate for the – usually minimal – loss.

“This is everyone’s space, you know. You don’t just get to move in here and blast your music when some of us are trying to _concentrate_ and actually work around here,” Erin snapped. “It’s not a playground. We’re not children.”

Holtzmann whistled low, fighting the sting of insecurity because Erin knew all her fears.

When they’d become friends, once the engineer had learned to trust, once she believed that Erin wasn’t just going to abandon them like she’d done to Abby years ago, she had opened like a flower.

When they’d become more than friends, Holtzmann had blossomed under the physicist’s careful touch that felt so eager to learn and satisfy.

Currently, they operated in the romantic equivalent to limbo, neither ‘just friends’ nor ‘dating,’ because Erin had ruined that pipe dreams weeks ago when she’d run her mouth off to Dr. Gorin about dating Kevin when, in truth, their precious receptionist didn’t seem to ever fully comprehend her attempts to flirt with him in the first place.

Beyond that, she’d stopped flirting with him weeks ago after their lips met over a sparking containment unit that Holtzmann had been trying to patch before Erin just _couldn’t help herself_ and brought their bodies together like she’d been possessed.

“Ah, so I’m childish. Good one,” Holtz quipped. “Guess I don’t have to warn you about that tunnel slide I plan to install next week, then. You wouldn’t know how to use it anyway. You don’t know what _fun_ is.”

Erin’s eyes narrowed.

Holtzmann had always felt insecure about her manic behaviors, her tendency to medicate with jokes and the occasional bout of self-deprecating humor. She had to be the life of the party because if she was making everyone laugh, they weren’t as likely to focus in and see the cracks in her armor. When she was ‘on,’ she could deflect and distract to take away from the plethora of questions people likely had about her once they got to see who she really was, how she really was, and Holtz got so tired of the questions and the funny looks that she didn’t really understand how to read.

Erin had learned about her gently, through trial and error, and she had been so, so grateful.

But every blessing was a double-edged sword, with them, because now that Erin had all the tools to unhinge her armor, she knew how to destroy the soft spots inside, as well.

Most of the time, Holtz trusted her not to use the knowledge that so few people had against her, but other times, Erin was a warrior with that silver tongue and those pointed looks that made Holtz feel so, so small.

The engineer knew she didn’t mean it; this was just the way Erin worked through her drama and her stress, she lashed out because she couldn’t contain all that darkness inside a carefully crafted sarcophagus that was meant to be well-groomed and properly maintained, a carbon copy of pristine academia and success that wasn’t really Erin Gilbert at all, not when you peeled back the layers and sunk deep.

“Everything’s a _game_ to you, Holtzmann. But this work – _my_ work – has been something I’ve sacrificed _so much_ for. We’re happy to have you here. Grateful, even, but you need to understand your place.”

“Abby’s work,” Holtz said softly, her voice gritted and angry, tight around the edges like a spring, ready to snap. “You abandoned it. Abby didn’t, and _she_ brought me onboard. Not you.”

The Ghostbusters were a team, now. A family. And maybe she and Erin had endangered that bond by finding each other on too many cold nights when reality was too stark and the air was just still enough to make them lonely.

Maybe they had made a mistake.

“How _dare_ you,” Erin seethed. “How many times do I have to apologize for a singular lapse in judgment without you bringing it up and throwing it in my face?”

Now, the dance began. Holtz pushed off her work bench and stalked around it, sliding her glasses down over her eyes like a weapon because she needed that shield, that protection, whenever they got like this. It helped her mental clarity and focus, it gave her strength to do the things she never really wanted to do, especially with Erin.

Because Holtzmann never wanted to hurt Erin, but sometimes she was pushed. Sometimes, the physicist didn’t know her own limits and fought back with teeth and claws when Holtz was content to use pads and practice swords – she feared for her own sanity, feared being an unmatched opponent, and when Erin was ready to play dirty, she had to be prepared to fight back.

And Holtzmann could fight, too.

“Ruh-roh,” the engineer chimed in, a cartoonish voice enveloping her words. “You can dish it out, but you can’t take it, can you, Gilbert? It’s only fun when _you’re_ the one in control.”

Erin always had a vice-grip around control.

She loved it more than anything.

She worshipped it, breathed it, fucked it.

Holtz knew Erin’s weaknesses, too.

“I’m leaving,” Erin said suddenly, and even though it was probably for the best, they breathed their sighs into the air and were disappointed – on some small scale that was toxic to them both – that the fight seemed to be over.

“Par for the course. Walk away,” Holtzmann called after her, waving her exit with a grand, sweeping hand motion that Erin caught out of the corner of her eye.

Erin whipped around, hair flying behind her, and her hand moved up to smooth over her bangs.

“Why do you want me to stay so badly?”

It wasn’t a question, but a challenge that struck a chord in the engineer’s heart.

“You keep running from me,” Holtz said, and it was about more than the argument, about the transitional give and take that they liked to toy with like a cat batting around a dead mouse. “From us.”

“There is no _us_ , Holtzmann. We’re friends.”

Holtz would have taken any other insult the physicist could have thrown at her, but not that one. Wild eyes met, and she set her jaw hard, resolving herself to strength instead of crumbling at her foundation because she knew Erin didn’t mean that, either. The engineer stalked toward the taller woman and got in her physical space, pushing the limits of her own need for sensory stimulation just to be close to someone who showed her, every day, just how much she still had to learn.

Erin never stopped being a challenge, never stopped making her question and wonder.

Whenever Holtzmann felt like she had the older woman pegged, figured out, completed, she showed another side of herself that made the engineer scrap her progress and start over, working with the raw materials she’d gained in her previous harvest and trying to make sense by shoving the pieces back together.

“You sure ‘bout that, hot stuff?”

Holtzmann put her hands on Erin’s body; one was on her hip, circling around her waist and the other landed on her bicep, playing with roughly hewn fabric against her callused fingertips. When the engineer stepped close, she felt the physicist gasp and shudder, her eyes fluttering closed in that instant.

It felt like a victory, albeit a small one, and she was helpless to savor it and run the taste of quiet submission against her lips because Erin didn’t bend so easily.

“Holtzmann,” she gasped when strong fingertips sank into her hips and pulled her close, anchoring her, and the rage hadn’t subsided – not completely – but it was unwarranted, and the physicist was starting to realize that as she bowed and ebbed against the blonde’s touch.

“So… _this_ …” Holtz backed Erin up against a wall, placed her leg between the older woman’s thighs, and pressed up, waiting for that spark to decrepitate and fissure around them in the heat. An unstoppable force met an immobile object and Holtz slammed Erin back against the solid surface, hard, drawing breath from her lungs in a sudden expulsion. “This is friendly to you?”

“No,” Erin moaned, and Holtz indulged in the sound as she pressed up again, waiting for Erin’s hips to grind back down against her and meet the heated contact.

“Why do you keep fighting this? Erin, I---“ Holtz said, the words falling dead on her lips because she didn’t want to break the moment with tenderness when Erin still denied her own feelings. “I _want_ you.”

It was second best, a hushed whisper against a racing pulse when her lips met the redhead’s neck and teeth grazed the spot.

“We can’t. We can’t do this again,” Erin said, shaking her head and pushing Holtzmann away. The engineer stood there, dejected, her head hung and she waited for the physicist to gain her bearings before heat tore into her again, one that was forged in the fires of dismissal and not lust, as they had been previously.

“You say that every time, Er,” Holtz chuckled, rolling her eyes. Erin met her gaze again a second or two later but this time it was stone that cast her in Medusa’s shadow.

“I mean it this time,” Erin said, and maybe it had been the argument that had set them off course because sometimes the physicist still needed her, and every time, Holtzmann was too keen and too quick to give and give until it hurt. “I have to go.”

“Are you pissed ‘cause it’s not on your terms this time?” Holtz asked, trying not to let the pain ebb into the cracks in her heart where she was trying to make room for Erin, where she’d been saving space for months for when the other woman was finally ready to build a home there, on solid ground. “You’re put off because I want you, too, and I’m not _afraid_ of it?”

“I’m not afraid, Holtzmann,” Erin insisted, arms crossed against her chest as she visibly tried to shake off the engineer’s words before round two started in a hurry. It was already stampeding down the corridor, just like always, because when they couldn’t find solace in each other, couldn’t understand each other, they fell to this madness instead.

“It’s funny,” Holtz said, chuckling, and Erin turned with an inquisitive look when she did. “You like to say that I’m immature and childish because of the way I am, and maybe I cling to you being the adult because you’re older and more grounded than me, but you’ve still got _so much_ growing up to do.”

“Oh, fuck you,” Erin spat, and Holtz grinned from ear to ear like she’d just won the grand prize at some carnival. She bounced a little and rubbed her hands.

“Ohohoho, _now_ who’s being childish?”

“I’m not the one dancing over her pride at being a jerk, Holtzmann.”

“Name-calling! Wow, it just keeps building, doesn’t it?”

“I don’t even know why I _like_ you,” Erin said, shaking her head. “You’re obnoxious.”

When Erin got mad like this, Holtzmann couldn’t always help herself. Maybe it was a little like playing with fire, but she’d always been reckless, _dangerous_ , and sometimes the fire just hurt so _good_. The engineer knew she was poking at a caged animal, and she closed the distance between them, capturing Erin’s mouth with her own, kissing the physicist until their lips bruised and she broke the skin on the redhead’s bottom lip, lavishing the hurt with her tongue in broad strokes while their tongues battled inside and outside of their mouths, wet and hot and slick while they moaned into the void.

Erin pulled back and brushed her bottom lip, frowning.

Holtz waggled her eyebrows and leaned in again, but Erin pushed her away.

“I’m leaving,” Erin said, and Holtz merely shrugged and leaned back against her work bench.

“Okay, hot stuff. But you’ll come back. You always do,” she grinned because she’d won this round and Erin would lament about it later then call her in the middle of the night with a veiled invitation for raunchy, filthy sex that would have them moaning into the early hours of morning when the sun first colored the sky. “Hey, Erin?”

Erin turned and looked at the engineer, but said nothing.

Waited.

“Who ya gonna call?”

The engineer gave one of her signature slow winks.

Erin flipped her off and slammed the door behind her.

 

* * *

 

 

But Erin didn’t call.

Erin didn’t call, and Holtz sat at her apartment waiting for that door to open again and her heart ached because she couldn’t shake the feeling that settled into her bones like a creaky sigh that maybe the door was closed forever.

That maybe, this time, she’d finally bashed in that final nail and fucked it up for good.

And what was _it_ , anyway?

Holtz sat on her bed with her knees drawn up to her chest, staring at the blank wall in front of her and drumming softly on her knee caps, the quiet sounds and steady movements falling in line with her circadian rhythm because she couldn’t stand the silence and couldn’t keep checking her phone for a text message that hadn’t arrived and willing a phone call to filter through just when she was seconds away from giving up.

_It_ was stolen glances when nobody else could see, a smile that crinkled around Erin’s lips and landed on her heart before traveling South when that innocent expression smoldered.

_It_ was a laugh that held too long and too loud whenever Holtz cracked a joke that wasn’t really _that_ funny, but Erin humored her because she didn’t want her to feel alone.

_It_ was tremulous kisses that started off so unsure but turned to liquid fire under duress because longing was too much and they’d danced around an uncertain future and _want_ for months – probably since the moment they first saw each other and Holtz was _interested_ and Erin was _curious_.

_It_ was the way Erin gasped into Holtzmann’s mouth whenever she came, too unafraid to let go completely until the engineer dismantled her and took her to places she’d never seen before, universes she’d never thought to explore with a painstaking care that seared into her flesh with promises that she’d never have to go alone.

Holtzmann felt the overload of emotion searing her tear ducts and she gritted her teeth, too stubborn and angry at herself to let anything fall.

She named the beast in the stillness of twilight because _it_ couldn’t be avoided or tucked away any longer, even if Erin seemed damn determined to keep her at arm’s length.

 

* * *

 

 

Patience was hard to come by for someone who was born under a crescent moon of lights, colors, and sounds that made her personality just as voluminous as the rest of her.

Holtzmann’s desperate quest to hold such fortitude in her grasp was exhausting, an uphill battle that had started somewhere along the path toward an endless journey and before she knew it, she had completely lost her way.

At work, Erin still laughed at her jokes, but never as loud or as long, and sometimes she didn’t even meet the blonde’s eyes when she did it.

Any attempts to get her alone, away from Abby’s keen notice as much as was possible and Patty’s watchful eye, were met with perfectly logical, gently worded excuses or abrasive movements that brought Erin closer to the other two Ghostbusters and further away from her. The distance was inches, before, and now it transformed to miles that expanded down a vast crevasse where Holtz had previously laid her hopes and dreams and fears, hoping Erin’s kisses and laughter could warm her demons and put them away for good.

At first, the engineer tried to be understanding. Their work was important, and Erin obsessed over it, lost herself in the gritty details of what kept the ship afloat so they could all beat together in tandem and save the world, but it was more than that. Erin was on a constant quest to prove herself right ever since her stuffy colleagues at Columbia had turned their eyes to doubt and cast them upon her.

Beyond that, in a darker area of the physicist’s psyche, there was a burning need to prove them _wrong_ and show them, and that darkness drew Holtzmann in like a moth to the flame even when she was trying to be good and soft and quiet.

Maybe if she showed Erin that she could be a mutable object, that she could wither under the physicist’s desperate need for control and be what she needed when she asked but never outside of her tidy little boxes and rubrics she could win back the older woman’s favor.

She could have Erin in her arms again and finally get some _rest_.

This new formatting dragged on for a week and had her drawn and quartered into such a convulsive, emotional state that she was jumpy, antsy, every resounding force around her causing panic and high-strung antics that led to bolder pranks and louder actions.

It drove her friends _insane_ and usually they were so good about tolerating her.

Tolerating her.

Holtz chewed the word and spat it out as she loudly clattered her tools at her desk and scattered them to the winds, waiting for Erin to make comments again and call her out.

If she wanted provocation, by God Holtzmann would give her some.

But Erin never took the bait.

She’d give Holtzmann a look that was stoic and maybe just a little curious, but silent as the grave while she chewed on a pen and licked her lips while she concentrated at her white board.

As soon as Holtz saw the vein in her forehead pulsing, she’d amplify bass-heavy music and drop something breakable, but not terribly important.

Erin started doing her work downstairs.

All her inventions clattered on the floor and Holtz mourned some of the irreparable loss when she took the broken pieces into her arms and cried over them, but she hadn’t been thinking during her impromptu tantrum.

And at least she could fix _some_ of this.

At least she could put her hands to _something_ and build it better than it was before.

 

* * *

 

 

The next stage, once she’d surpassed anger, was bargaining.

Cranky, volatile Holtzmann turned into bright, helpful Holtzmann and she followed Erin around like a puppy dog, trying to insinuate herself in constructive ways that would build the physicist up and maybe bring about an opportunity to earn her keep.

Sometimes, Erin seemed happy to let her assist and began asking for her advice on certain theories, trying to figure out how to add her doctrines to the engineer’s flawless knack for design. Seamlessly, Holtzmann went above and beyond to make anything the physicist wanted a reality because she had a scientific theory that if she could just _show_ Erin that they were always meant to work together in tandem, it could translate outside of work again, too.

She lost sleep over it, took on extra assignments and abandoned her other projects.

Patty called her out and Holtz blew her off; she waited for guilt to hit her because Patty was her friend, too, but until she had Erin back, nothing else mattered.

Her desk was covered in blueprints by the end of the week, results of their collaborative efforts, of how two geniuses could really move mountains when they found themselves in sync. There had always been a reason why she and Erin worked together so closely, and not just because their chemistry ran fathoms deep. Maybe their progress had been halted for a minute, but Erin’s smile finally met her eyes again and she told Holtzmann she was _proud_ of her, and the engineer couldn’t stop beaming as she practically floated around the firehouse.

“Hey Er,” Holtz called, jogging to catch up with the physicist before she left for the day. Holtzmann didn’t know if she had plans, mostly because Erin was sort of quiet about her personal life unless something specific came up where she had to disclose. Usually, she was better about keeping the engineer in the loop but things had been different between them lately and they were still walking on eggshells. “Wait up.”

Erin paused, her jacket halfway off her body as she paused a few steps before the door and turned.

“Did you need something?”

_Other than you? Nothing._

“Don’t let me hold you up or anything, but I was thinkin’ maybe if you didn’t have somewhere to be we could go grab a bite to eat or something?”

Holtzmann’s eyes blossomed with hope that sparked brighter than the fear that existed in a concurrent layer, and she hoped the physicist couldn’t see that deeply or see how much she _wanted_.

“Oh, Holtz, I’m so sorry but I actually had plans,” the physicist breathed and pursed her lips sideways, a little micro-expression that Holtz couldn’t read. For a second, she wondered if Erin really was sorry or if that was a front. She tugged her jacket on the rest of the way and gave the blonde a small smile. “Rain check, though?”

The blonde shrunk a little as her shoulders sunk and she exhaled her hope, allowing it to dissipate and die in the space between them.

“Sure, sounds good. Just let me know.”

A two-fingered salute oversaw Erin’s departure from the firehouse and Holtzmann turned, sulking back up the stairs toward metal and electricity, her dependable friends that would never leave her.

 

* * *

 

 

Two hours into sitting in her lab, and Holtzmann was doing her best impersonation of a petulant child who was pushing peas around her dinner plate. She had a screwdriver in her hand and was flicking nuts and bolts across the table, shooting goals into the trash can, anything to expel the nervous energy that flooded her system. It was just past eleven, and the engineer knew she should go home, but nobody ever minded when she spent the night at the firehouse. She had a twin bed tucked into the corner just for the late nights when she couldn’t pull herself away or when she was chasing some fast-approaching deadline. Abby always arrived earlier than the rest of them and caught her sleeping, then returned with coffee and food to ensure she was well-nourished and not burning the candle at both ends.

The world thundered around her at a quarter to midnight, and Holtz pressed her cheek against the glass as she watched, fascinated, at the rain pouring outside the window. Lightning split the sky in two every so often, and goosebumps rose on her flesh. Holtzmann could almost taste the change in the air, the heavy weight of it that would surround her if she left the comfort and security of her lab. Maybe that was part of her problem; she leaned so heavily on bolts of lightning to sustain her that she forgot how to enjoy the taste of the sun. And what was Erin Gilbert if not the sun to her, at the very least? Without further preamble, the engineer grabbed her trench coat, throwing it around her shoulders like a superhero’s cape before she slid down the pole and raced for the door. She locked up behind her and caught a cab in the downpour, grateful to live in the city that never slept.

Because neither did she these days.

Holtzmann knew she should have called ahead of time, but she didn’t, choosing to bang on Erin’s front door in the pouring rain and wait for the physicist to answer her face-to-face. The coat did some good to keep her from being soaked to the skin, but it wasn’t completely effective and rivulets of water caught in her curls and streamed down her face as another boom of thunder pulsed, nearly as loud as her endless knocking.

Erin swung the door open and rubbed tired eyes as she squinted in the darkness of the outside world, at an hour where most reasonable people with nine-to-five jobs would be sleeping or heading in that direction.

“Holtzmann?”

“Can I come in?”

“You’re drenched,” Erin said, her face softening with compassion as she opened her door and ushered the blonde inside, not seeming to care – at least, not for the moment – that she was dripping water all over her hardwood floors. “Wait here, I’ll get you a towel.”

Erin’s feet padded down a dimly lit hallway and she disappeared around the corner. Holtz shivered, even though the physicist’s house was warm, and waited patiently for Erin to return. Lightning struck again, lighting up the foyer, and Erin emerged with a taupe-colored towel that looked warm and fluffy. Instead of handing it around Holtz’s shoulders, she eased the engineer out of her jacket and hung it up, then opened her arms and wrapped the towel around the blonde. Erin’s hands lingered, her gaze dropping to already tight-fitting material that now left very little to the imagination as it clung to pale skin, and then she pulled her hands – now slightly damp – away from the towel and rested them against light blue silk pajamas instead.

“Sorry for just showing up unexpectedly,” the engineer said, clinging to the towel’s warmth and patting herself dry as best as she could, trying to avoid more water on the floor to save herself the potential drama of the redhead’s irritation.

“No, you’re not,” Erin said simply, her mouth a thin line as she tilted her head to the side and looked at the blonde with another expression that went over Holtzmann’s head.

“Okay, fine, I’m not,” Holtz said softly, exasperated. “What do you want from me, Er?”

Another crackle wedged its way between them, and within seconds, they were on their way toward another fight.

“Answers. You’ve been acting off this whole week. Why don’t you start there?”

The physicist’s tone was clipped, and Holtz raised a defiant eyebrow.

“ _I’ve_ been acting off? Jesus Christ, Erin, it’s like you’re trying to punish me at every turn. You barely talked to me, and then you were _avoiding_ me after the last time we talked, and out of the blue you started acting like everything was good and fine and it’s _not_ fine.”

“You did that to yourself. How was I supposed to act when you threw it in my face that I always call you when I’m---“

“When you’re _what_ , Erin? Lonely? Horny? Is that all I am to you, a way to scratch an itch? Because I’ll buy you a vibrator and you can borrow my goddamn batteries, if that’s _all_ it is,” Holtz spat, tightening the towel around her body because she needed the compression to keep her from flying off the handle.

“Oh, trust me, I would love for that to be the solution so I wouldn’t have to deal with _you_ anymore,” Erin retorted. “I already have a vibrator, anyway.”

Holtzmann laughed, unable to contain it when Erin choked on the word for something entirely practical that most grown-up women had in some form or another.

“How hard was it for you to say ‘vibrator,’ I mean, really, Erin?”

“Shut up,” the physicist said, a blush rushing to her cheeks.

“See, it’s not like you’re a _prude_ or anything because I seem to recall some pretty filthy things coming out of that smart mouth of yours,” Holtz said, a shit-eating grin crossing her features, and she could taste the limit approaching her, could see the boundary line approaching, and she closed her eyes to ignore it, pressed forward. “ _Oh God, Holtzmann, fuck me harder, more fingers, just like that…_ ”

“Get out.”

Holtz whimpered, and her features softened, instantly apologetic because she hadn’t meant it like _that_.

She knew she shouldn’t have done _that_ at all, but something had come over her, pushed her beyond herself and she just couldn’t turn it off when that train rolled into the station. Sometimes, she didn’t know when to quit and it had disastrous results.

If only she knew how to tell Erin that she’d missed her, that the weeks had been torture without her, that she laid in bed every night thinking about holding her just as much as she thought about stripping her bare and tearing her apart.

But she didn’t have the words for that, so she parroted Erin’s again in a cruel mimicry instead.

“Erin, it’s not like that, I didn’t mean---“

“Get the hell out, Holtzmann.”

The engineer could see her being rattled in that pristine cage, could see the control shattering, and she knew Erin was about to get _angry_ , and Holtzmann thought maybe she should go while she still could, before she broke anything else.

“Hey, it’s nothing to be _ashamed_ of. It was kinda hot, actually.”

“I’m not going to tell you again.”

It wasn’t fair, how Erin could be so beautiful when she was angry and even more so when she was angry at _her_ , and maybe there was something wrong with Holtz’s coding that she’d want to see that clenched jaw tighten and voice deepen while rigid shoulders stood proud and made the physicist seem taller, somehow, like she could tower over her when really there was only a minor height difference between them.

It just wasn’t fair how Holtz could love something so much and work against her better judgment to destroy it, and any chance they had, in one fell swoop.

“I wanted to talk to you,” she tried instead.

“Too late,” Erin said. “I’m tired, so you need to just… go.”

It amazed her, how Erin could soften so quickly when she flashed her blue pools of regret in the redhead’s direction, and maybe it was a kindness toward her or a weakness in Erin’s coding as well, but the engineer was suspended between whether she wanted to fall on this singular note of mercy or rile the older woman up again.

Erin seemed to trust that Holtzmann would fall in line with her request out of respect for her or for their friendship or, if nothing else, to spare their working relationship. She turned her back, preparing to head back to bed and Holtz _reacted_.

Cold, slim, pale fingers wrapped around Erin’s wrist and tugged.

“Don’t walk away from me again,” Holtz whispered, but it was rough and fierce and she could have sworn she heard Erin sigh into the darkness. “I can’t fucking stand it when you do.”

Erin whipped around and was on Holtzmann in seconds.

The towel fell away from the blonde’s shoulders and crumpled on the ground. Her body hit the front door so hard she could feel her blood rushing to the surface to form a bruise, and Erin’s hands were on hers, pinning her against the unforgiving surface. Holtz groaned into the ferocious kiss that the physicist met her with – it was hot, wet, and merciless. Raindrops beaded with sweat that fell down Holtz’s forehead when Erin breathed hot on her face, the scent of toothpaste lingering. Erin left her marks all over Holtz’s neck when she bit harder than she’d ever dared before, right against the blonde’s racing pulse, and after her body had a second to register Erin’s aggression, she felt the beast inside of her respond in kind then flipped them, using the fact that she was just a little bit faster and stronger than Erin to her advantage.

Holtz pressed her wet body against Erin’s, absorbing the redhead’s warmth as they kissed again, slowly this time, stoking the fire to ensure it would burn all night.

Fingertips found the small buttons of Erin’s pajama shirt and exposed warm, soft, tanned skin and Holtz put her hands inside the material, over Erin’s flat stomach before sliding up to her breasts and squeezing, noticing how her nipples pebbled instantly at the temperature difference and the heat behind each caress even if the blonde was still shivering.

She peeled back the collar and bit down on the nape of Erin’s neck, causing a gasp.

The fabric fluttered to the floor a second later, joining the towel in a heap, and Holtz scooped her hands underneath Erin’s ass, picking her up with a soft moan and allowing the physicist to wrap her legs around the engineer’s waist as she carried her upstairs to her bedroom, because she’d been here enough times to know the way.

Eventually, they always seemed to find their way back to each other.

Sometimes the distance between was greater, merely a flicker in the wind, and other times it stretched like a cavern that cut between their sensibilities, breaking them down slowly before it culminated in too much and too soon.

They always found their way back.

Time was relative, and resistance was futile.


	2. Lightning Strikes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew. What an incredible response to this fic I almost let sit on my hard drive and rot forever. I had a little bit of the beginning of this written when I posted the first part, mostly because I couldn't stop writing it, but also because I didn't know if there would be any point in continuing. What if you guys hated it? I mean, it is a totally different side of Holtzbert, but the more I think about it and read your fabulous comments, the more I realize there's a reason for taking them on this particular journey.
> 
> That being said, here's the next part - I hope you enjoy it as much as the first. As always, your feedback is greatly appreciated. 
> 
> PS - I Tumblr now. If you want to find me, I'm @thegadgetsandgizmos. Stalk me if it pleases you.

Erin always marveled at the intensity of the blonde, the way all that tireless energy could conspire into a central point of cynosure. All her life, she had flown under the radar, fueled by her own brilliance and the knowledge that just because other people didn’t necessarily take note, her value was still impressive. Erin tried to push herself out into the limelight with her book, with her research with Abby, but she had paid a high price that resulted in mockery, in academic decay, in skeptics flocking just to tear her apart. Instead, she’d retreated and confined herself back under the radar in a man’s world. Back into a box.

With Holtzmann, she felt the security of being the center of someone’s universe.

And she waited for the other shoe to drop.

It dropped frequently, clattering to the floor loudly and often and sometimes in mysterious, devastating ways because Erin had always been good about finding things she could control, but she learned quickly that she couldn’t tame fire.

The engineer was the human embodiment of electricity and every force of nature that existed, and when she skimmed hands over Erin’s naked flesh, the physicist could feel her atoms arching to meet that touch, could feel the cells of her flesh and blood crying out for the attention like Holtzmann was gravity personified.

Thunder rattled her bedroom windows and Holtz’s hands were smooth down the soft muscles in her stomach that trembled under familiar contact that still wasn’t seared into her flesh deep enough. Warm, full lips wrapped around a nipple and sucked and Erin’s hands met the back of a wet, blonde head, tangling her fingers into curls that had spilled down the engineer’s shoulders like a life preserver. She felt Holtzmann smirk around her breast and it was playful, a lighter beat for a second as she found herself drowning in crystalline blue pools that always seemed shrouded in heavy enigma; no matter how good of a scientist Erin was, she’d never been able to crack that code completely. For all she knew, Holtzmann would be mysterious to her forever.

“What?”

Erin’s voice was a whisper that sought out the meaning behind the interruption because they had been so hot and heavy moments before.

“You said ‘rain check,’ Er. Got into the spirit of that offer, didn’t you?”

The physicist groaned, irritation and amusement hitting her in counterintuitive waves because as much as she wanted to kiss those smug expressions off the engineer’s mouth, sometimes she also wanted to smack her.

“That wasn’t what I meant.”

“Uh-huh. Nah, it’s good,” Holtz murmured, the goofy expression remaining as she flickered her tongue over Erin’s nipple and made the physicist’s hips buck like a natural reflex. She was smug, still, and Erin’s brow knit in response, features darkening.

They never stayed in each other’s good graces for long.

One of them always ruined it.

Usually Holtz with her big, loud mouth.

“You were the one that showed up at _my_ house in the middle of the night, in the pouring rain,” Erin protested, getting loud and tense again for all the wrong reasons.

Holtz laughed and nipped at her sternum, delighting in another moan because she had Erin right where she wanted her.

“You didn’t have to answer the door.”

“Would you have left?”

“Eeeeeeeh, probably not. Or maybe eventually. I would have called,” the engineer considered, her face twisted in thought for a second as she ticked through outcomes in her brilliant brain.

“You’re hopeless,” Erin sighed.

“It wouldn’t have taken this long if you weren’t _stubborn_ ,” Holtz groaned, easing agile fingertips up a smooth inner thigh.

“You like me stubborn,” Erin retorted, because she knew the juxtaposition of how she molded with Holtz and added to her catastrophic mania was a delicious combination for them both. It bordered on lethality, a careful poison that had them by the throat.

“I like you wet and begging,” Holtz growled into her throat as she tested Erin, traced her fingertips in heat and slickness before throwing caution to the wind and slamming two fingers home, _deep_ and pulling a gasp from Erin’s soul as the physicist shivered beneath her. This wasn’t about tender lovemaking and eternal promises; the engineer wanted to sear her mark into the deepest part of Erin’s body and leave her memory there, etched like a brand for anyone who might follow. She wanted to set the bar to impossible heights because when Erin stopped this, when her control finally twisted in the wind enough to snap, she’d know at least nobody would have _that_ part of her because Holtzmann had ruined her first.

“ _Holtzmann_ ,” Erin groaned, a broken cry into the stratosphere and Holtz smiled against her skin.

“And there’s the begging,” she purred, smug, and Erin tugged her hair at the roots, steering her into a brutal kiss while she slammed her hips against Holtz’s fingers. Their teeth clicked against each other, and the exchange was hurried in its savagery – they were lost amongst the thunderclaps, the rain that battered the window, and the sound of their breaths comingling on waves of sticky pleasure as their bodies writhed in the center of Erin’s bed.

Erin locked her legs around Holtz’s, twisting them together and rolling so she was on top, and she trapped the engineer’s hand between them – if she was going to be taken in this way, it was to be on her own terms, at least until the blonde wiped that smug grin off her face. Holtz whimpered when Erin took a third finger inside her, rocking her hips forward as she took her impossibly deeper and tossed her head back with a fulfilled sigh.

When Erin took, she liked to show Holtzmann just how much she could handle. That she was controlled, but strong. The physicist liked to prove she wouldn’t break, and furthermore, that she wouldn’t always bend to the engineer’s demands; she could be owned and destroyed, dismantled and put back together just like one of Holtzmann’s inventions, but she didn’t _belong_ to her.

She didn’t belong to anyone.

And maybe it killed something in Holtzmann every time Erin gave her a sidelong smile when she dressed and left the blonde’s apartment or when she rolled over, but didn’t want to be held.

But when they were wrapped together like this, it was her opportunity to own a piece of Erin Gilbert that nobody else would see, at least not at that moment, because if Holtz was in her bed, nobody else was occupying the space and she wouldn’t have to wonder on sleepless nights if she was in the process of being replaced.

If she’d finally pushed their stupid, ongoing, reasonless fights too far.

If Erin had finally had enough.

Holtz was dripping all over the sheets when Erin finally came, making a mess as she squirmed in the evidence of her own need and looked at the physicist with awe and hunger. When she came back down to earth, Erin licked the engineer’s fingers clean, taking the time to savor her own taste because she knew how Holtz was on the edge of implosion and yet willing to watch, just a second more, because the visual imagery that hit her senses and lit her up like a pinball machine was too good to rush.

“Erin,” Holtz hissed, and the physicist kissed her, sharing the flavor and proof of her satisfaction with her whimpering, keening lover before she drug her mouth in wet, avaricious lines down the blonde’s pale skin. Erin marked and bit relentlessly, keen on saving her place before she drank her in.

For someone who was so hell-bent on taking, on fanning the flames and watching things explode, who used to wax poetic about watching the world burn when it all got too much, she was happy to take, flat on her back, completely at Erin’s mercy when the older woman licked inside her more skillfully than someone with her limited experience in this department should be able to achieve.

Erin was, if nothing else, an overachiever.

Which was why, when she took Holtzmann to heights she’d previously thought to be unattainable, impossible, she had to relax against plush pillows and resign herself to her fate of never being as thoroughly _had_ by someone else.

Because Erin didn’t just own her body.

She owned her heart, too.

And maybe it made her flush with trepidation when she moaned too loud or praised too much when fingers sank deep and she usually didn’t crave penetration, but she gave, and gave willingly.

Because she craved _everything_ the redhead could give.

It was dangerous, reckless, and she was used to being reckless with her experiments, but never with her body – not intimately.

Never with her heart.

Erin kissed her mouth, sticky with Holtz’s juices, and swallowed the sound of her own name when Holtz came, loud and fearless.

Holtzmann crumpled into herself afterward, counting the seconds before she’d have to leave.

 

* * *

 

 

Erin never slept after Holtzmann left.

As much as it pained her to send the blonde away, the notion of her company cut into something deeper that struck marrow when she realized that, for the first time in her life, she wasn’t content as a completed entity.

At some point in the past year, she had fissured into two and tried to widen the divide instead of embracing completion.

When the bed cooled beside her or she went home alone, Erin felt the gap in the fathoms of her soul that tried to reach out beyond the walls of her boundless tenacity and bring the blonde home.

Home.

Home with Erin, where she belonged.

She knew this fact like it held the core of reason in its hands, tenuous and somehow perfectly stable.

They both knew this.

They just couldn’t sensibly speak of it, couldn’t put to words what their bodies had gotten so successful at sharing with one another in moments of passionate intimacy. Erin would find herself staring longer at Holtzmann when they worked together in the following days after an evening spent together, her eyes pooled with longing and need while her jaw fixed tight and she attempted to focus on her equations. Nobody noticed, as far as they knew, _certainly_ not Kevin, but sometimes she caught a blur of recognition in Holtz’s sharp, observant gaze. It was a look that stripped her bare every time as it occasionally ran hot with memories of just how well this woman knew her, both inside and out.

Because this beast that flexed its muscle between them could be so good if they would only allow it and afford to let it breathe.

It had potential and might, the ability to withstand if only they could trust themselves and each other enough to be gentle with fragile, reckless organs in their chest.

But they were seldom gentle with each other, and that was the startling force of the issue.

So Erin would acknowledge that wondering, hopeful gaze once it settled on the knowledge that they both wanted the same thing with a kind, but distant smile and start the process of forgetting for as long as she could stand before the cycle inevitably repeated itself.

Eventually, Erin started noticing little changes in the engineer’s routine that made her wonder just how much Holtzmann was forgetting, too. If, perhaps, the blonde’s process of doing so was actualized and not caught in a loop like her own. She’d return from lunch – and sometimes _leave_ for lunch – with a doggy bag and coffee for one. Erin never asked Holtz to bring her back anything, but she’d never had to before. Holtzmann’s nights at the firehouse weren’t as long or as random. She became more routine and reasonable right before the physicist’s eyes, and not gradually.

A week went by and Erin felt the loss of Holtz’s random invites to dinners and movies and random outings more than she’d ever expected she might. Where they had been a mild annoyance at times before, a pressure she couldn’t explain, they were now a brilliant, beautiful part of her week that she had taken for granted. There was a pit of regrets and so she tried to reach out before she drowned in it like sticky tar that drug her further down to the bottom the more she struggled.

It stung her skin from head to toe because Erin knew she was partially to blame.

Or even mostly to blame, since she was always so keen on sending the engineer away when she could see in Holtzmann’s eyes that she wanted to stay, and yet was too proud and self-respecting to lower herself far enough to ask. Erin knew that Holtzmann was too good to throw herself on the physicist’s mercy, and she knew that the blonde could do better than her; it was a dangerous dance, and maybe the steps were rewarding from time to time, but it was a time bomb when all was said and done and they were constantly on the lookout for the other shoe to drop.

When they got to tango with happiness, it was a wondrous thrill, but it never lasted long before they were at each other’s throats – figuratively, but occasionally in a literal sense – and had to start over, retreating to her whiteboard and Holtz’s workbench and start from scratch with a new game plan that somehow, they always managed to rake over the coals. Neither woman seemed confident in their abilities to just enjoy and take the positives in hand to warp those into some sort of steady ground, a foundation worth building upon; they were more content to tear it apart into some unrecognizable mess that held pieces of their hearts and sensibilities like shrapnel. Erin had cut out the rational part of Holtzmann’s brain and stripped the nerves like wires, fraying her edges and forcing her to lean on her animalistic sensibilities, on the storm that always waged within her and got channeled into productivity because since she’d joined the Ghostbusters, the engineer had a purpose.

Sometimes, she felt like it wasn’t worth it if she couldn’t make loving Erin part of that purpose, too.

Holtz started waking up in the mirror and hating what she saw – dark circles under her eyes from too many sleepless nights alone, shaky hands because she was so on edge, a slump to her shoulders because her self-esteem had taken a hit from bearing weeks of Erin’s cold shoulders that finally, _finally_ turned warm, but she’d be damned if she’d weaken to them now, after the last time and the time before that and the time before that.

And then there was Erin.

She tried.

She exhausted herself trying to work her way into Holtzmann’s heart – and her bed – again, but found she was ill equipped to deal with a broken version of the manic engineer.

Not when she had likely broken her in the first place.

 

* * *

 

 

A river forced its way into a fjord, a fork in the centrifugal force of nature itself when Erin and Holtzmann found each other in the quiet after a bust. Erin was finishing getting the ectoplasm off herself – out of every crack – in one of the emergency showers they had at the firehouse. Holtz had stripped off her uniform, getting settled in comfortable boxers and a tank top in preparation for a long evening working on the packs, making upgrades while they were fresh in her head, because there had been a few hiccups and they had to be on top of their game if they wanted to stay alive. Abby and Patty marveled at her dedication, but Holtz saw it as refuge more than anything else these days; it was a distraction to get her mind off all the nights it had been since she’d last tasted Erin Gilbert on her tongue.

Thirty-six nights.

Thirty-six nights, nearly thirty-seven.

It might have not held a position near the apex of her brain where the mechanical information sat, where the precipice of her being, the driving force of her identity lay, and she was grateful for that because if she lost herself, she lost everything. She couldn’t lose that, too.

Ultimately, Abby and Patty left once their packs were in their trusty engineer’s capable hands and offered to bring coffee in the morning – overly sweet and caffeinated, just to her liking – and said their goodnights before the blonde was suspended in the quiet hum of her own machinery. It was comfort and peace, and for extended moments, she forgot she wasn’t alone in the firehouse. It was a sign of healing, she thought, that she didn’t dwell on Erin’s presence anymore, not like she used to back when they were tap-dancing around each other and making veiled innuendo about promises they couldn’t keep and ones they never intended to keep in the first place, but made anyway.

“Are you staying overnight?”

The voice was soft and caught her by surprise. Holtz’s slim digits paused mid-turn as she tightened a bolt on Abby’s pack, intending to loosen the sides to replace the coils. Her eyes didn’t look up from her work, didn’t dare because when Erin was most beautiful when she was fresh as the morning, free of make-up, with nothing to hide the years and emotions – good and bad – that colored every smile line, every frown, every hint of the fact that the physicist had lived.

“Lots of work to do,” Holtz muttered, her hand jolting back into motion like she had been shocked, prodded by some guiding force that kept her tethered to responsibility instead of recklessness. “Can’t keep my babies without check-ups for long. Keepin’ them healthy keeps us all alive. Safe as houses.”

“Do you need anything? There’s enough food in the fridge? I got more of that cereal you like, the kind with a thousand calories per spoonful the other day,” Erin mentioned, and it was thoughtful. More thoughtful than she’d been in the weeks during their stand-off. At least, directly.

“Tyrannosaurus Crunch,” Holtz chimed in.

“With the marshmallow dinosaurs, yes,” she confirmed.

“You’re not gonna say it’s kid’s stuff and I should worry about cavities?”

Erin chuckled.

“Your oral hygiene has never seemed to fall by the wayside,” Erin said, exhaling softly in the space that seemed to expand around them, pushing them further apart even though Holtz could _feel_ the physicist moving closer, curious, bare feet padding against the floor and she never remembered Erin choosing to go barefoot in the firehouse. She’d made comments against such behavior, if memory served. “Have you ever had cavities, Holtz?”

“Two. Plenty,” Holtzmann said, her words clipped.

“I’ve never had a cavity,” Erin replied, crossing her arms as a little wistful smirk fell over her features. Holtz was spying with her peripheral vision, unwilling to raise her head and risk getting swept out to sea.

“More checkmarks in your perfect column, eh, Gilbert?”

“My parents were strict. They never really let me have sweets when I was young,” the physicist continued, and it was different, to see her opening up like this, to feel the breath of fresh air between them because usually Erin kept her cards so close to her chest. “I always went to Abby’s house when I needed my sugar fix.”

“I never had anyone who cared enough to even ask if I brushed my teeth at night. I basically had to look out for myself. Do it on my own,” Holtz responded, but it wasn’t said in a tone that invited pity. Not at all. In fact, when she heard the redhead suck in a telltale breath, her blue eyes snapped up and found Erin’s, fixing them with steel and a pursed line to her lips. “It’s fine. Turned out all right, didn’t I?”

“Were your parents…?”

“Why do you care?”

Holtz’s palms were flat on the surface of her workbench when she interrupted the older woman. Her shoulders bowed and her head tilted to the side, analyzing the human in front of her, the one who had a death grip on her heart, and _pushed_ her to madness.

It was a question that could exist in so many different outcomes, in so many universes that weren’t even necessarily this one, this moment, when the conversation had been so innocent and yet nowhere near frivolous as it might seem to the casual observer. Nothing was, with them.

“I’m just trying to get to know you, Holtzmann,” Erin said, her tone quiet and wavering, almost like she might cry and Holtz wasn’t used to _that_ , not when Erin usually fought her with rigid steel in her spine and a hard-set jaw that took no prisoners while the fires burned in their bellies.

“Don’t you think it’s a little late for that?”

“I was hopeful it wouldn’t be.”

Erin’s eyes were dewy and anything strong in Holtz crumpled instinctively as she waddled toward the edge of a cliff, unable to see the rocks below that would surely crush her if she ambled too far, carelessly.

“Why now?”

“I don’t know. I just…” Erin said, then sighed. “I just _miss_ you, that’s all.”

Holtzmann whimpered, her hard lines bending, and she cursed under her breath.

“Thirty-six days, Erin. No, fuck that, let’s just call it thirty-seven. Do you know what that means?”

“Thirty-six days? For what?”

“Christ, you don’t even _know_ ,” Holtzmann said, flailing her hands before they sprung to her hair, tugging at the curls that sat closest to her scalp in frustration. “Because I sure as shit do. I’ve been counting, Erin, counting every night since the last time I was in your bed when you kicked me out and then started pretending like nothing happened. Worse than all the other times, I might add, because at least then you were kind of _fun_ about ignoring me. Like I was some dirty secret instead of your dirty laundry.”

“Holtz, you have to know I didn’t _mean_ …”

“Didn’t mean to what? Kick me out? Treat me like I was suddenly some shameful thing you did because you, what, fell face first into my vagina and now you’re gonna be weird about it?”

“You were in this, too. Don’t even pretend like you haven’t been cold and stoic and _awful_ ,” Erin said, crossing her arms and there was a flash in her eyes and _then_ the fire came. Holtz prepared for it, because weepy Erin would destroy her, but combative Erin was an opponent she knew how to face. “You’ve been awful to me, Holtzmann.”

“Please tell me how I’ve been awful to you. Go ‘head, _princess_ ,” Holtz said, waving a hand in a flourished, faux magnanimous gesture that was overexaggerated and catty. She coupled it with a bow.

“You stopped making time for me. Even before, when we were just friends, you’d ask me to lunch or bring me things, make me feel important, and you’ve stopped doing all of that and I feel like I mean _nothing_ to you,” Erin explained. Holtz laughed in her face, slapping a hand against her workbench like she’d just heard the most hysterical joke in the world.

“You’re seriously bitching because I stopped bringing you presents and making heart eyes at you?”

“Don’t belittle my feelings! I’m trying to _share_ with you!”

“Where’d you pick that up, Gilbert? Therapy?”

It was a low blow and they both knew it.

Usually Erin would respond in kind, pulling something from the few tidbits she did know about Holtzmann as her own warped ammunition and they’d go until they had to quit or until they tore each other apart, naked, on the floor or against the nearest surface.

This time, Holtz felt the sting of her own wounds like she’d turned the gun on herself and Erin slumped to the floor, sobbing.

“I don’t know how to fix this and it _kills_ me that I let it get so bad,” the physicist choked out, and Holtz was immediately next to her, on her knees even though the floor was cold against her bare skin and discomfort settled into her bones instantly. She endured and she wrapped her arms around Erin, waiting for the struggle, for the fight, for the profanity to slew out of the older woman’s mouth like a fine mist and a sharpened blade. Instead, Erin’s tears soaked through her tank top as the redhead clutched at the straps and pulled her closer, finding her for strength and not ceasing, even when Holtz initiated contact by rubbing Erin’s back with slow up and down motions at first and then soft circles in the center. “It’s all my fault.”

“It’s okay. We don’t have a clue what we’re doing here,” Holtz said, her voice soft and completely devoid of any of its previous ire. “I’m sorry. That was a really shitty thing to say to you, and I wish I could take it back.”

“Why do we keep hurting each other?”

Erin looked up, nuzzling Holtz’s neck just above her collarbone and the answer swelled between them like a forbidden truth that they both knew, but couldn’t say.

You always hurt the ones you love the most.

You always have.

“Can we try again?”

Erin sniffled and nodded against Holtz’s shoulder as she settled further into the engineer’s lap.

“I don’t know if we can just erase everything,” Erin replied.

“We don’t have to erase it. We take our mistakes and we try our hardest to learn from them. Because this could be worth it, don’t you think?”

“I’ve always thought that, I just didn’t know how to _tell_ you.”

“We fight a lot, but that’s because we’re so different, Er, and we’ve both still got a lot to learn from each other. But I’m willing to try if you are,” Holtz said, tucking a few strands of the physicist’s hair out of her face.

“We really do fight a lot, don’t we? More than I’ve ever…”

“Yeah. Guess we bring out the worst in each other, huh?”

“And the best. I think you bring out the best in me when you’re not being an asshole.”

Holtz chuckled and kissed the top of Erin’s forehead.

“When you’re not being a stuck-up, self-righteous bitch, you’re pretty amazing.”

“Gee, thanks, Holtzmann.”

“Think nothing of it, sweet cheeks.”

The engineer winked at her, slowly, and a dimple popped out in her cheek. Erin leaned up to kiss it and they both burned.

It was the first time they had each other in such proximity and didn’t immediately react by tearing each other’s clothes off.

“Will you come over tonight? Work for a couple hours, if you want, but… come to my place afterward?”

“Why Erin Gilbert, don’t you think you’re a little emotional for that sort of excitement?”

A swat to her shoulder stung the bare skin it reached, but they both laughed it off and it was the first time in a long time that they had felt light, happy, _free_.

“Not for sex. To sleep. Just to sleep,” Erin promised.

Erin never let her sleep over.

“I haven’t slept in weeks.”

“Me, either.”

Holtz sighed, and it was shaky, belying the toll all the emotions had taken on her as well.

“I’d say we’ve earned a good night’s sleep, then.”

“So you’ll come over?”

“If you hang around for an hour, I can get to a decent stopping point and we can share a cab.”

Erin sat up and left a few, lazy kisses against Holtz’s neck and pulse, enjoying the moment and their truce, the peace they’d found in each other’s arms.

The calm before another storm.

“Will you do me a favor, Erin?”

The physicist blinked away the redness in her eyes and felt like the tears had finally subsided as she cleared her throat, trying to chase the last of the strain away as well.

“Sure. I’d say I owe you a favor or two.”

“Or ten, or fifteen…”

“Don’t push it, Holtzmann.”

Holtzmann leaned down and captured Erin’s lips softly, a whisper of a kiss that was gentler than any they’d ever shared. It wasn’t rushed and existed in the space between heartbeats, prolonging their rhythms because it was almost like everything stopped, including time itself, when they found each other again like this.

“Go on a date with me. A real date. Saturday night.”

“Fine. Take me somewhere nice so I can dress up for you,” Erin said, coquettish and with the glimmer of something heated that simmered in those iridescent blue eyes. Holtz swallowed hard and nodded furiously.

“You’ve got yourself a deal, hot stuff. Now can we get off the floor?”

Erin nodded and Holtz helped her to her feet, just like the perfect gentleman, and they settled into a routine just like everything was normal again.

That night, they slept so hard that it took Abby and Patty calling them each six times to wake them from their slumber just to inform both women that they were three hours late for work.

When they’d made it to Erin’s bed, they had easily tangled in each other’s arms, and they’d stayed that way through the night. Even when Holtz rolled over to answer her phone that was blaring at her from Erin’s other nightstand, she kept an arm coiled around the physicist’s waist like a protective python.

The week went by too fast, and their first date went faster.

Holtzmann brought flowers at the beginning, they’d gone dancing in the middle, and it had ended with a heated make-out session on Erin’s front doorstep and nothing more.

Just like the movies.

They went ice skating for their second date.

They didn’t have sex again until the third date, and when they did, the anticipation got them both so hot that the first few rounds were over quickly with the intensity of a nuclear explosion that threatened to claim everything, including the earth itself, in its wake.

Three months later, the fighting started again.

Two weeks after that, Erin started dating someone else.


	3. Resonant Thunder

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, how I do appreciate your patience with me while I try to get my life sorted and work schedule in a way that I can manage enough muse to write. It's slowly hitting tourist season, which means a madhouse summer for me, and I've been overseeing a lot of training for our new hires. You guys are a patient lot, and I'm so grateful with you sticking with me and continuing to leave reviews/support and the like. Here's a nice long chapter for you, I do hope you enjoy and I'd love to hear your thoughts as always. <3

Break-ups were hard, but theirs was more brutal somehow.

Holtzmann, naturally, wondered if it was because they had never really been a _them_. They were new, starting from bare soil and attempting to build a foundation that would hopefully turn into something strong and beautiful and sturdy. They’d erected walls, a general shape of what they wanted their future to look like together. The outline had been present and glorious, once Holtz started believing that their tremulous start could blossom into something that would bear fruit. The first time Erin whispered that she could stay the night, that she _wanted_ the engineer to stay when Holtzmann tried to gently extricate herself from the physicist’s bed for probably the thousandth time since they’d started sleeping together, something in the blonde had shattered beyond repair.

She’d cried.

She’d cried, and Erin’s slim arms wrapped around her while the redhead kissed her tousled curls, still sweaty and stuck to her forehead from the hours of rigorous activities, and told her that she’d wanted this for a long time, but she’d been too afraid to ask.

Erin wanted to know it meant something for both of them before she started to hope.

After that, the two women cried together.

Holtz marveled at how impossibly _blue_ Erin’s eyes could be when she was struck by so much emotion, when they were watery and tear-filled. She wondered how someone who was already flawless could be so pretty when she cried. Always determined to fix the hurt, even when there was none and the tears were markers of joy and perhaps slightly tinged with fear of the unknown – which was rational, given their origin story – the engineer had traced the salt tracks down high cheekbones, down smile lines that were becoming more visible by the day and added to the physicist’s beauty in a way that made her heart swell inside the cage of her chest.

They cried themselves to a peaceful, dreamless sleep.

Holtz stopped sleeping after Erin walked out of her apartment for what was probably the last time.

A clumsy hand gripped one of her wrenches as she tightened bolts on a new weapon for Patty, a proton saber of sorts that was inspired by _Star Wars_ , of all things. Holtz yawned and Abby winced from across the room because it had been her tenth yawn in under five minutes. First, she had been jittery from the caffeine, her system overloaded by a repulsive mix of bitterly strong coffee and way too much sugar to overcompensate for the acrid taste. Once the caffeine faded, Holtz could cling to that heavy bitterness on her tongue that stuck like a film and was almost enough to make her forget the taste of Erin Gilbert who looked rested and poised as ever at her white board. The engineer tried not to stare, tried not to weaponize a longing, stilted gaze that was cloaked by exhaustion and the remnants of hunger because she couldn’t quiet her reckless heart.

“Holtzy, you’re gonna strip the bolt.”

“Say wha?”

“The bolt. Lefty loosey, righty _waaay_ too tighty. You’ve been cranking it for five minutes.” Abby’s voice broke her gaze and Holtz blinked, stunned, and shifted in her seat. The usually quiet creak of springs that had been overworked due to all her fidgeting was a loud roar in her ears, so sensitive as she was to the world around her when she was forced to live in it these days.

“Oh, fuck.”

“Yeah. Salvageable?”

Holtz looked down at the wrench and the marks she’d left in metal. The threads that had once been a perfect fit and now no longer were. She liked to think she was so good at fixing things, at creating something from scrap parts that most would write off as nothing and make them beautiful, useful, even life-saving.

Maybe she was better at tearing things apart.

“I dunno. Gotta have a look-see.”

It had been her mental prison, lately, the inclination to walk herself through every moment of boundless laughter, every kiss, every stroke of two bodies that seemed destined to collide again and again. Holtz had replayed the audio and visual of all her tapes, all the details that had been stored away in a file marked ‘Erin Gilbert’ so she could figure out how to claim the physicist’s heart for a lifetime even though she was likely undeserving.

_If you’ve lost something, you just have to retrace your steps._

It was an adage that brought her no comfort now, wisdom that people clung to when they were frantically searching. She’d been searching for years for something like what she felt with Erin, and the logistics of lightning striking twice in the same location was improbable, at best. She knew odds and statistics, knew science and reason. Holtzmann had logic to spare.

But so did Erin, and that was the kicker that rattled her heart and frayed the stitches she’d placed along all the years of seeping cracks until they were nothing but gory, gaping wounds.

Her reasoning had been sound.

Solid.

_We just don’t work together, Holtzmann. We hurt each other more than we help._

She’d argued, a passionate closing tale that she’d hoped would turn the redhead around and change her heart but she could Erin’s heart breaking, too, as they stood in her living room taking paces around her couch but always keeping it between them. It was, she knew, because they were too afraid to touch and risk falling back into each other’s arms, into bed where they would attempt to bandage the wounds with tape and glue instead of proper medical supplies. They were always looking for that quick fix, that ‘I’m sorry’ and ‘I forgive you’ that was good enough for the moment and better when they were orchestrated as one, two perfectly harmonic instruments that knew at least one part of the song and could play in tandem.

The rest of the composition fell apart.

When all was said and done, when they both stood there, exhausted and breathing as if they’d run a marathon, Holtz had asked Erin for a goodbye kiss.

_Just one_ , she laughed bitterly, _for the road._

Erin had walked forward and when the blonde had expected to feel the gap bridged and hoped that kiss might steal her final breath, she received the warm touch of a gentle hand, the fingers she loved pressed against her damp cheek. A parting glance and a gaze that held too long before the physicist’s lips parted into a broken smile that she knew was as strong as the older woman could manage.

_You know I can’t._

There had been no further apology, and Holtz was silent and still as death as she stood there, frozen to the spot without an ounce of fight left in her.

Erin Gilbert left her life as quietly and unexpectedly as she’d entered.

Holtzmann hadn’t even seen it coming.

“I think I’m going to grab lunch,” Erin spoke up suddenly from the white board. Holtz looked around the room and felt a chill in the air, as if her thoughts had conjured some sort of darkness to spiral between them, or Erin could sense that she was deep in thoughts of painful memories that were slowly eating her alive. “Do you want anything?”

The question, she knew, was directed at Abby but would have easily been extended to Holtzmann if she’d made a request. Erin was firm in her choices, but never cruel.

“Where were you heading?”

“Deli?”

It was a simple enough option, and for all the delis that existed in New York they were blessed to have one of the best ones just a few blocks down the street from the firehouse.

“You know my usual. Bring extra pickles, though?”

“Sure.”

Erin didn’t ask Holtzmann, but Abby must have sensed the slump in the blonde’s shoulders, an unwillingness to ask for anything, to speak up unless she absolutely had to when the physicist was taking point in a conversation. Abby _knew,_ but she respected them both enough not to say anything. After their break-up, she’d been good about informing them that she wouldn’t be placed in the middle, that she loved them both, that she wouldn’t let them ruin their working relationship, but she’d be there when or if either of them needed to talk. Holtzmann wondered if Erin had told her anything, especially since she was in the early stages of building a foundation with someone new. Someone else.

Holtz had never taken Abby up on her generous offer to talk and spill her guts into the floor. It would be impractical, she knew, because once she opened herself up like that she wouldn’t be able to put Humpty Dumpty together again.

“Holtz, you hungry?”

“’Mfine. I’ll eat something later.”

Erin’s eyes caught hers in a rare moment when Holtz looked up from her work, from the scraps that she tended to like her own personal island of misfit toys; she hadn’t been as good at creating lately given her new penchant for finding the weirdest salvage that didn’t really lend itself to proper weaponry or even repairs, but somehow she was determined to give it a home.

The physicist knew this line was one of Holtz’s favorites, one to throw them off the scent that she hadn’t been eating. Her clothing was usually ill-fitted and baggy in odd places, but even the more form-fitted garments in her wardrobe hung from her willowy frame lately, which was concerning given the blonde didn’t have much extra to lose.

“Okay. I’ll be back.”

There was concern written all over the older woman’s face, but it wasn’t her place to insist Holtz eat anymore, not like she used to when the blonde pulled her sporadic all-nighters because she’d had a touch of genius and just couldn’t bring herself to stop long enough to devour even a basic sandwich or bowl or cereal. Erin had tried stockpiling granola bars at her work bench, but she never touched them these days. She’d probably thrown them all away out of stubborn spite.

Abby paid no attention to the whimper that left Holtz’s mouth when the door closed behind Erin. It struck the blonde like a sneaker wave, and it was likely the engineer hadn’t even realized that she’d made the sound.

But she went back to tightening the bolt, screeching metal against metal, and Abby sighed into her coffee because she couldn’t leave Holtz alone, but she couldn’t stand to see her friend like this.

All she could hope – all anyone could hope for, really – was that time really would be some grand, universal healer.

 

* * *

 

 

The months that passed warmed them like a breath of spring after a long, hard winter.

Holtz started laughing again, mostly with Patty, and some of the fire returned to her eyes.

She was still exhausted, but her clothes were fitting properly once more, and she cracked a joke on occasion. Everyone gave her space, even Erin, because she was like a baby deer that was learning to walk again. Erin’s feelings had been considered in the beginning, when the hurt was still so fresh for both of them, but the physicist had decided to medicate with a new relationship and the loneliness that Holtz felt, along with the obvious conflicted emotions of being unwanted and unloved when they were so close to something very real and deeper than either woman had likely wanted initially was palpable and crept into every syllable that the usually effervescent blonde managed to utter. Each sound seemed strangled, like she’d had to conjure some great force that required a sacrifice of everything she had in her tank just to function to bring auditory bursts from her lips.

They hadn’t chosen sides, but Holtz had needed more of their support.

In a break-up, there was always a more wounded party. It was just the way of the world.

If something breakable is thrown onto the ground, the odds of it cracking precisely in half are slim to none. There are always pieces, fragments of a greater whole, and the smallest pieces can cause the most damage when they splinter into unsuspecting flesh.

Erin was good about not bringing her new girlfriend around the firehouse. Abby and Patty had both met the woman on a few, sporadic instances where they had agreed to meet Erin somewhere and she’d magically tagged along. They knew Erin wanted them to like her, to approve, and she wasn’t a _bad_ person but she never made Erin laugh the way Holtz did. Erin didn’t seem as comfortable in her skin when their hands touched. There wasn’t that catastrophic spark that, yes, could occasionally be combustible and dangerous but at least it was _passion_.

They’d both given their approval in quiet whispers because, in truth, what sort of friends would they be if they didn’t want Erin to pursue her happiness even if it didn’t seem to mesh as nicely as it did before? Abby and Patty still only had pieces of the full tale of what had ended Erin and Holtz’s relationship to begin with because neither woman talked about it, except up to a point, and that point was likely the final piece of the puzzle. It was hard for them to make bets on someone they cared about, but neither Abby nor Patty saw the relationship lasting more than a few months – six or seven at the most – and while they hadn’t placed any sort of monetary wager because it seemed too crude and disrespectful, not to mention nowhere near their business, they’d offered to buy the victor lunch for a week. So Abby put her marker on eight months to be kind while Patty, ever the realist, put hers near the six and a half month mark.

Holtzmann had taken up a new hobby – competitive laser tag – with Kevin to keep her mind distracted when she had idle hours because she couldn’t just stay at the firehouse and tinker indefinitely. Their team was currently ranked number one in the state, and Holtz was riding the wave of victory like she was being welcomed into the gates of Valhalla when a warm, summer rain brought Erin Gilbert to her doorstep at an inappropriate hour of the evening.

“You’re drowning the carpet,” Holtzmann said. She noted the physicist had chosen to brave the streets of New York without a jacket, and the gesture was reckless as she had been when she was much younger and more naïve. Holtz hadn’t even aged a year – almost, but not quite – since she’d allowed a storm that raged outside and in her heart to bring her into Erin’s arms, but she felt like she’d endured a lifetime and gained enough insight for the next few, if such a thing existed. Being alone had been a blessing, she’d discovered, because it had allowed her to be introspective in ways she never had been able to do before when she was either channeling all her unwanted thoughts and self-esteem issues into projects so she wouldn’t have to process or chasing after someone who would never love her back. Even when she’d been with Erin, she hadn’t had the courage to look too deep inside because she loved the person she was with the redhead and didn’t want to discover another side of her; she didn’t want to wake up transformed into someone else.

“I had to see you.”

Holtz gripped the wooden doorframe for stability, as if she was clinging to this new shred of sanity, the gifts she’d given herself, for dear life.

“Why? I’m not the person you run to anymore. I haven’t been that person for months.”

Seven months, twenty-two days, and six hours. But who was counting?

“She and I had a fight.”

“Did she kick you out? Because you should go to Abby way, way before you come to me for sanctuary,” Holtz said, her brow furrowed because it wasn’t like Erin didn’t have her own place even if she barely stayed there anymore.

“She didn’t kick me out, I left.”

Holtz softened. A poisonous bloom started in her heart, just the beginning of a seed taking root, but still present before she could nip it in the bud.

“For good?”

“Yes,” Erin said softly, then shook her head. “No. I don’t know.”

“Must’ve been a hell of a fight,” Holtz retorted, still leaning on the doorframe, her body blocking Erin’s path so she couldn’t just push her way in even though they both knew she was too poised and polite to try for something that was so like _Holtz_ to do.

“But it _wasn’t,_ and that’s the thing,” Erin explained, her eyes wide and desperate as if she longed for Holtz to see through her just like she used to before they started to decay. They used to speak with a look, communicate without needing to use their words because sometimes they couldn’t. Sometimes, speaking to each other was dangerous and touch was better. “She was so… placid.”

Erin spat the word out like it was venomous.

Holtz bit back a laugh.

“Miss Perfect is too perfect, huh? Can’t ruffle your feathers the way you always claimed to hate, but I knew better.”

“Don’t,” the physicist said. She gritted her teeth, the words leaving her in a dangerous rumble. Holtz waited for blue eyes to snap to hers, full of fire and fury like they always used to, with heat that could consume them.

“Why not? You showed up at my doorstep for something. I don’t have a right to ask a question or two? It’s been _months_ , Erin,” Holtz continued. “You barely even treated me like a person. Certainly not like someone you loved.”

They’d never exchanged those words.

They didn’t have to.

“I never said I loved you,” Erin replied. It was flippant, an airy toss of her head like she was some sort of pristine royalty and Holtz was beneath her.

“You did, though, hot stuff,” Holtz said. “And maybe you still do. Why else would you come back?”

“Ugh, I _knew_ this was a bad idea,” Erin groaned, clenching her fists and flailing in place, a visible nod to her endless frustration, to the battle that warred within against her need for common sense and decency. Her integrity that had been so solid for months, the calm and control that had returned. She lusted for chaos again, and chaos was something the engineer could provide, whether she liked it or not.

It made Holtz burn in delicious ways; it made her body sing, her blood boil, and a spike of arousal strike between her legs.

“Tell me why you’re here, Erin.”

It wasn’t a request, nor a playful addendum to their tumultuous banter. It was a command.

“I needed to feel something. You always made me feel _something_.”

Holtz licked her lips, and while she knew the hunger would overtake her in seconds, the quiet voice in her heart that was still nursing the last of her wounds begged her to stop. To shut the door. To say no.

She silenced the voice and grabbed Erin by the front of her shirt, dragging her inside.

 

* * *

 

 

Erin’s body arched up against Holtz, trying to test the engineer’s strength and perhaps even pull at her resolve while she struggled underneath her on again, off again lover. The blonde’s hands held a vice grip, a commanding hold on Erin’s forearms, pushing her down against the mattress, keeping her in place while she keened and whimpered. Because she had chosen to be the restraints, the tethering force that would deny the physicist movement – or at least much movement – she couldn’t touch as she wanted, and so she tried to make up for the lack with her body. Holtz pressed down slowly, sliding her bare flesh against the redhead’s, grinding between legs that pooled at the apex with heat and glistening wetness in abundance; it was perhaps more than Holtz had ever managed to stir before, and she’d managed to an impressive degree. The distance, she thought, might have helped with their longing for each other; it stoked a flame that had never really been extinguished even while they took their time away from each other and tried to forge new, solitary paths and lives alone where they could envision a future that wasn’t together. Beyond that, there was the illicit knowledge that Erin wasn’t really _hers_ , sort of like she hadn’t been before when they were tap-dancing around an elephant in the room. Their hearts had always belonged to each other, probably, but neither woman dared to stake claim aloud and deal with the fallout of what that might mean. It was almost safer, Holtz thought, for Erin to belong to someone else because then she could only have so much; if the physicist couldn’t give her all, she’d have to reconcile what she had and be satisfied if she wanted anything.

And having _anything_ – the whimpers, the gasps, the sweet taste of Erin’s tongue as it intertwined with her own – it was all priceless, a lifetime of searching for treasure in a barren wasteland only to strike it rich just before she was bound to give up completely. They were terrible at loving each other – they both knew that – but they were excellent at fucking each other, two forces of nature unbound and determined to shake each other apart with their ferocity, unbridled and relentless as they crashed upon familiar shores that had, at least in Erin’s case, been altered by another’s hands in the interim. It wasn’t brand new terrain, but it was different, and so Holtzmann was keen to explore. Determined, even, and cocky about making a difference.

“Is this your way of punishing me?”

“For what?”

Holtz lifted her head from Erin’s breast just seconds after she’d clasped her teeth around a swollen nipple and gave her lover an innocent smile.

“For leaving. For not trying harder,” she listed off the reasons and choked back a moan as the flat of the engineer’s tongue lavished the spot that she’d bitten – roughly – before she’d feigned innocence to throw Erin off her scent. “For dating someone else.”

“If you want this to be punishment, Gilbert, whatever floats your boat,” Holtz quipped. “Me, I see it as fun. Long overdue.”

Erin’s eyes darkened, but not from lust.

“What, did you think this was meant to happen or something? Only just a matter of time? I take my relationships _seriously_ , Holtzmann. I care about her.”

“Easy, tiger. Put the claws away,” Holtz said, releasing her grip just a little because even though she loved to make Erin struggle, she also knew about the older woman’s fear of cages. The way she got antsy when she was getting irritable and couldn’t find an immediate reprieve. Holtz paid attention to the little details and memorized them because she had been more than serious about having the woman beneath her for good, for keeps, and maybe Erin hadn’t felt the same way, but she couldn’t help herself from doing what had been so natural, it was almost easier than breathing. The blonde relished every detail for better or for worse; she loved every mark and flaw and scar, every story Erin told, every fear she unearthed, every dream she hoped to be able to fulfill one day. “I just meant we stopped everything. I didn’t think you’d come to me like this, but I’d hoped you wouldn’t stay gone forever.” Holtz bit the inside of her cheek and cast her eyes down, muffling her words against Erin’s breasts as she nibbled the soft skin and hoped the physicist would take her next statement as flippant, insincere, a curt throwaway that meant nothing just as she’d accused the blonde of doing so many times before. “I know what this means.”

“So I’m not going to have to worry about you getting all sullen and depressed?”

“Because you’re gonna go back to her?” Holtz clarified.

Erin didn’t answer, and that was answer enough.

Holtz sucked in a breath because she’d been sullen and depressed for months; she greeted those emotions as an old friend, as someone she could clutch tight against her bosom and know, inside and out, to a dependable degree. In some ways, those feelings had become the truest friends she’d ever known. Would she promise she wouldn’t find them again? Or, more accurately, that they wouldn’t return to her doorstep once all was said and done and the redhead washed her hands of this? No, but she knew she could lie when it counted, so she tried her best to be convincing. She softened the blow by relinquishing her hold of one arm and sliding that hand between Erin’s legs, taking stock of the arousal she’d created with one, long stroke of her fingers that was enough to make the older woman’s hips tremble and jerk, helpless.

“Nah, hot stuff. S’all good.”

“ _Fuck_ ,” Erin shivered, and Holtz responded by driving two fingers home, deep. She curled them up and felt Erin gush around them, already so overworked and ready for more. She barely even had to try. Holtz wondered when the last time anyone had fucked her like this was, if she was living with sexual malaise and spent her nights longing, even though she’d never admit it.

“That’s what I’m tryin’ to do.”

“Shut the fuck up and _do it_ then,” Erin gritted out through her teeth, giving the blonde a wild, hungry stare. Holtz smirked and added a third finger, curling them up again and finding that sweet spot immediately; she had that detail memorized, too. The engineer started a slow pace, one that made Erin coo and whimper, her breath expelled in ragged grunts and breathy whispers almost like a series of reverent prayers while the blonde picked up the pace, just a little, in a step-by-step fashion that built upon itself like a crescendo as it plodded through a chromatic scale to seek out those infinite, high notes that were nigh impossible to achieve.

Erin didn’t seem to notice much change, just that she was lost to sea and drowning – happily, so it appeared – and content to be wholly at the blonde’s mercy. Holtz could hear the symphony and bathed herself in a sea of sound.

Holtz had never been the gambling type, but by Erin’s responses _alone_ , she wagered a silent bet against herself that the physicist hadn’t had it this good in a long while. Maybe even since the last time they’d dallied, before it had all been broken beyond repair. Something kept pulling them back together, some long-standing universal force that saw them as nothing more than two objects in the blip of space and time that were set on a destructive crash course that would leave them with nothing.

And perhaps being left with nothing wasn’t the worst thing, Holtz thought as Erin’s hands found her hair and used her, tugged her close for a bruising kiss because she wanted to hold herself back from screaming. Holtzmann kissed back, at first, and then pulled her mouth away and pushed harder with her fingers, relentless and savage thrusts that shattered Erin’s resolve as the redhead tipped her head back and made the exact sounds her poised, contained self would do anything to avoid in most cases because they were debauched and undignified. They gave no question about Holtz’s control over her, the strings she held as puppet master that were directly linked to the darkest fathoms of Erin’s carnal pleasures and boundless lust that only struck in excess for one person. Holtz didn’t have to ask because she _knew_.

Erin’s leg curled around Holtzmann’s hip, an attempt to drive her deeper and Holtz bit down on the older woman’s neck in response, a brief lashing out of blunt teeth that was to discourage her taking matters into her own hands, so to speak.

“Always need to be in control, don’t you?” Holtz whispered, soothing the mark that was red and would probably make the physicist’s girlfriend question; the engineer certainly didn’t care about _that_ , because it wasn’t her job to explain. Her tongue laved over the spot, then full lips nuzzled as her mouth dropped near Erin’s ear and she sucked the physicist’s earlobe into her mouth before speaking. “Not now. Not tonight. Tonight, you belong to _me_.”

Erin gasped and shifted down, driving herself further onto Holtz’s waiting fingers, and the blonde chuckled out a response to the way the physicist’s body just couldn’t seem to help itself. She started a blistering pace, one that housed every second of her longing, her ire, her pain, and joined it into a beautiful reunion that she etched in the most intimate parts of her lover.

It didn’t take long, after that, for Erin to fall apart.

A scream tore its way out of the back of the redhead’s throat and she slumped into Holtz, shivering as pebbled flesh was warmed through by its counterpart. Holtz was so overwhelmed, flushed with her own arousal, and even though Erin’s reaction was due to the intensity of stimulation, a long-sought after release that she’d bitten back for months like an eternal quest and wild goose chase that evaded her, somehow, she felt at home with her vulnerability. Instead of curling into themselves, they curled into each other. Holtz was surprised at Erin’s instinct to fall into her, to be held, but wrapped her arms around the redhead anyway, not willing to question something that was so rare and so good while it lasted. It didn’t always last, after all, and it was more than she expected.

“I’m just catching my breath,” Erin sighed. “It’s been… a while.”

“Oh?”

“You _sound_ smug. I don’t even have to look at your face, Holtz. Stop that.”

“I just don’t understand, is all,” the engineer tried instead, trailing her fingertips up and down Erin’s spine in a pattern she’d learned was soothing to them both. “I could barely take my hands off you. I still can hardly keep away, and that’s only because I know you didn’t want me.”

“You stopped trying,” Erin said.

“Didn’t I have to?”

“I guess I had hoped…”

Erin’s voice trailed off. Holtz looked at her, trying to get the older woman to make eye contact and every attempt – including a clumsy kiss that had resulted in her lip almost being busted by a wayward elbow and teeth – was gracefully dodged.

It was more playful than they had ever been, and that made the engineer’s heart ache.

Seconds later, she was on her back protesting the change of scenery because she was supposed to have control, and she’d wanted so much for so long. Erin wasn’t having any of it. The sight of the redhead’s face disappearing underneath the blankets on a set trajectory, one Holtz knew _so very well_ added to the immense pleasure that came from obscured vision. She couldn’t see what Erin was doing, couldn’t see those flashing blue eyes taking pride in every moan and whimper she could pull from the blonde with her talented mouth, but Holtz could feel _everything_.

She didn’t protest for long.

She didn’t protest all night.

Neither of them did.

 

* * *

 

 

The sun rose and Erin was back in her arms. Their muscles ached, and Holtz was remarkably empty despite many hours of having some of her wildest fantasies fulfilled because there wasn’t really a need to hold back with each other, not when there wasn’t as much at stake anymore. Now, they could explore freely for a night because it meant nothing. It was supposed to mean nothing. Erin nuzzled into Holtz’s warmth and mumbled something when the blonde’s posture went rigid.

“What’s wrong, Holtzy?”

“You need to go, I think.”

Erin scoffed, chuckled, and leaned up for a kiss, which was denied.

“Oh, all right. You’re being serious,” she replied, shocked.

“What, you’re the only one who gets to have boundaries? Standards? You have a girlfriend, Er.”

“I’m definitely aware of that, Holtzmann.”

“You can shower if you want because it’s early, but I’m gonna get some shut-eye. I’ll see you at the firehouse.”

She rolled over unceremoniously and took the sheets – all of them – with her.

Sleep didn’t come easy, or at all, but she was good about pretending long enough to hear Erin get out of bed, shower, and leave with an abrupt slam of the door. Holtz got up to lock it and padded into the kitchen, choosing that precise moment to stare at her wall and eat a bowl of cereal on the floor.

Holtz knew she’d always be weak when it came to Erin Gilbert, but that didn’t mean she had to let the physicist _win_ all the time.

**Author's Note:**

> Thoughts? Tomatoes? Comments?


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